Three Things You Missed in Rolling Stone's McChrystal Profile

Unfortunately, President Obama missed an opportunity today to not only
replace an out-of-control general but an out-of-control and failing
strategy in Afghanistan. Meanwhile, mainstream media continue to miss
the most serious story contained in the now famous Rolling Stone
profile.

Michael Hastings' piece is about more than an adolescent general and
his buddies' school-yard shenanigans in Kabul and Paris. It was about
a failing strategy in Afghanistan and the disconnect between how the
administration portrays the war in public and the reality of how the
war is actually being waged.

Here are three points in the Rolling Stone article that contradict
what the White House has presented to Congress and the American people
about the war in Afghanistan:

"Instead of beginning to withdraw troops next year, as Obama promised,
the military hopes to ramp up its counterinsurgency campaign even
further." A senior military official stationed in Afghanistan told
Hastings: "There's a possibility we could ask for another surge of US
forces next summer if we see success here."

General McChrystal's Chief of Operations Major General Bill Mayville,
described the war in Afghanistan as unwinnable: "It's not going to
look like a win, smell like a win or taste like a win. This is going
to end in an argument."

"If Americans pulled back and started paying attention to this war, it
would become even less popular." This was how a Senior Advisor to
General Stanley McChrystal characterizes the war in Afghanistan.

While President Obama has been assuring Congress and the American
public that US troops will begin leaving Afghanistan next July, his
senior military leaders believe that if they are successful, next
summer could see a surge of troops, not a withdrawal. And the military
should be careful not to reveal what is really going on in Afghanistan
because the more Americans know about the war, the more they will be
against it.

Who is holding these guys accountable?

Congress needs to step up now and start demanding answers. Until it
gets them, it should refuse to appropriate the $33 billion in new war
funding that the Administration has asked them for.

This is about more than an out-of-control general in Afghanistan. It's
about the strategy, stupid, and the young men and women who are giving
their lives to implement it. Congress needs to send a clear and
strong message to the White House using the power that the
Constitution provides it -- the buck stops here! No answers to these
disturbing questions, no more funding for the war in Afghanistan.
Period.

And, it can send that message now. The House is scheduled to vote on
the administration's Afghanistan war supplemental funding request
before it leaves next week for the Fourth of July recess. It should
refuse to do so. And, when it comes back to work after the fireworks
at home, it should do its job and start demanding answers to all of
the other disturbing issues and questions raised in the Rolling Stone
article.

Now that the McChrystal side-show is over, it's time for Congress and
mainstream media to focus on the main event: the deteriorating war in
Afghanistan.